Thursday, March 25, 2010

This Dud's For You

Not many of you will understand the context behind the title of this post so let me explain. Justin and I appreciate the loyalty and interest taken in our site by you, the readers. In particular, we try to incorporate suggestions by some of our most avid followers.

This is such an instance. One of my classmates at ND, and fellow drummer, hereafter referred to as "Dud's" submitted an excellent recommendation for song of the day several months ago. With arguably as much appreciation for music as myself he has identified three key elements usually comprised in great songs:

1. Key change

2. Saxophone solo

3. Cartoon duck

Ok, so it is really only the first two out of the three that find themselves in most good songs. The cartoon duck pertains only to today's song of the day by Billy Ocean entitled "Get Outa My Dreams, Get Into My Car."

Born Leslie Sebastian Charles, Billy never had a strong affinity for his birth name. His first single was released in 1972 under the name Les Charles but he still sought something different.

Growing up in Trinidad there was a local football team near him named "Ocean's Eleven" after the 1960 film of the same name starring the five members of the "Rat Pack." Billy took the surname from the football team and released his first album in 1976 under the name Billy Ocean.

Ocean's career began to take off under the new name and in 1984 his album entitled Suddenly marked the pinnacle of his fame. The song "Caribbean Queen" reached #1 in the US on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and won him a Grammy Award for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance at the 1985 Grammy Awards. It became so popular that its title and lyrics were re-written for different regions of the world (African Queen and European Queen are alternate names for the song).

Several successful albums ensued including Tear Down These Walls, the 1988 certified platinum album through which today's song of the day was derived.

Thanks again for the tip, Dud's. Now if I could only get you outa my dreams and... well, you know the rest.